Talk:David Gold, Baron Gold

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Requested move[edit]

The following discussion is an archived discussion of a requested move. Please do not modify it. Subsequent comments should be made in a new section on the talk page. No further edits should be made to this section.

The result of the move request was: page moved. Speedily closed by BrownHairedGirl 15:45, 2 February 2011.  — Amakuru (talk) 16:51, 2 February 2011 (UTC)[reply]


David Gold (lawyer)David Gold, Baron Gold

Oppose - Best known for his legal career and for reaching the position of senior litigator in a major Law firm ad not as a peer. The lawyer disambiguation is a more appropriate disambiguation than his title.--Lucy-marie (talk) 11:51, 2 February 2011 (UTC)[reply]
Support. WP:NCPEER is quite clear. This chap is no longer wholly or exclusively known by his pre-peerage nomenclature. He was not WP:NOTABLE at all until appointed to the House of Lords. Kittybrewster 11:57, 2 February 2011 (UTC)[reply]
  • Speedy close. I have moved the article back to David Gold, Baron Gold, restoring the title to which the page was moved by its creator, within 5 days of creation, when nobody else had edited it. If another editor believes that this title is incorrect, they should open a WP:RM discussion from the existing title, rather than moving it first. --BrownHairedGirl (talk) • (contribs) 15:45, 2 February 2011 (UTC)[reply]
The above discussion is preserved as an archive of a requested move. Please do not modify it. Subsequent comments should be made in a new section on this talk page. No further edits should be made to this section.

Requested move 2011Feb02[edit]

The following discussion is an archived discussion of a requested move. Please do not modify it. Subsequent comments should be made in a new section on the talk page. No further edits should be made to this section.

The result of the move request was: page not moved.  Ronhjones  (Talk) 21:40, 24 February 2011 (UTC)[reply]


David Gold, Baron GoldDavid Gold (lawyer) — While one of the naming criteria listed at WP:TITLE is consistency with patterns used by titles of similar articles and documented in guidelines like WP:NCPEER, that consistency criteria also notes that titles indicated by such guidelines ideally are in accordance with the other naming criteria, like natural, concise and only as precise as necessary.

By using the current title as indicated by WP:NCPEER, we are choosing a title that is not the most commonly used name, is less natural, is certainly less concise, and is obviously more precise than necessary. All these are excellent reasons to ignore WP:NCPEER, and simply use the natural, precise, concise and name most commonly used to refer to the topic of this article, David Gold, disambiguated per WP:D: David Gold (lawyer). --Born2cycle (talk) 20:09, 2 February 2011 (UTC)[reply]

  • Oppose. WP:NCPEER is quite clear. This chap is no longer wholly or exclusively known by his pre-peerage nomenclature. He was not WP:NOTABLE at all until appointed to the House of Lords. Kittybrewster 20:47, 2 February 2011 (UTC)[reply]
  • Speedy close. WP:POINTy bad faith nomination based on an objection to the guidelines, rather than on the best way to name this article.
    B2C, it appears that you accept that disambiguation is needed. The issue is what disambiguator should be used.
    Your boilerplate arguments against the current title are a minor variant on those which you have cut-and-pasted into many similar RM discussions over the last few days, and in this case you didn't even bother to see whether they made any sense wrt to the article under discussion.
    Once again, you are trying to use an RM discussion as a venue for your war-of-attrition against the general principle of topic-specific naming conventions. You are quite entitled to disagree with existing policy or guidelines, but the way to change it is by a centralised discussion at WT:TITLE or WT:NCPEER, rather than by raising fundamental objections to the guidelines at numerous RM discussions. --BrownHairedGirl (talk) • (contribs) 20:50, 2 February 2011 (UTC)[reply]
    • Above, you wrote: "if another editor believes that this title is incorrect, they should open a WP:RM discussion from the existing title, rather than moving it first."

      I'm another editor who believes that the current title is incorrect, for the reasons stated in the proposal, and so I opened a WP:RM discussion from this title, exactly as you suggested. Now you're saying "speedy close"? Really? Unbelievable.

      We disagree on whether peerage information is better disambiguatory information than occupation in parentheses. That's an editorial decision which we decide by consensus as determined by discussion, not by closing discussions.--Born2cycle (talk) 21:35, 2 February 2011 (UTC)[reply]

      • B2C, if this nomination offered a specific reason for renaming this article to a format other than that in the guideline, then an RM discussion would indeed be appropriate. However, the rationale you offer is nothing to do with the specifics of this article: it is a generalised objection to the naming guideline.
        Since the points you make here express your concerns about the guideline, you should follow WP:MULTI and raise them at WT:TITLE or WT:NCPEER rather than running a campaign against the guidelines in half-a-dozen places simultaneously. --BrownHairedGirl (talk) • (contribs) 02:41, 3 February 2011 (UTC)[reply]
    • Oppose There is an explicit naming convention, which under WP:Article title should be followed. Editors who don't like that policy shouldn't disruptively go around moving articles with no better rationale than they disagree the convention. Nothing in your and Lucy's arguments have anything to do with this article or any of the other recent move attempts in particular, but rather show nothing more than your disagreement with the naming convention in general. Lucy has started discussions, including at WP:Article title, that have not resulted in consensus for her view. Despite that, perhaps because of that, there has been on a campaign recently to simply ignore policy and more articles to suit the personal preferences of, shall we say, a very small number of editors. What's all the more astounding is that in each instance the assertion has been made that the subject is widely known by their pre-peerage name, which assertions are not only unsupported, but are gutted by the fact that the person's very notability derives from receiving the peerage. Wasting other editors' time by doing this is disruptive and childish. These individual articles are not the place to take up a general disagreement about the naming convention. -Rrius (talk) 00:30, 3 February 2011 (UTC)[reply]
  • Oppose. There is nothing in the article to suggest this lawyer was notable enough to have an article before his appointment to the Upper House of the legislature. At the moment the reason he merits an article is because he is Lord Gold, therefore the article title should reflect that. (Something's just occurred to me - was he in Who's Who beforehand?) Opera hat (talk) 20:52, 3 February 2011 (UTC)[reply]
    • So should all titles of articles about people reflect the reason the person merits an article, or is this only true of peers? --Born2cycle (talk) 21:39, 3 February 2011 (UTC)[reply]
      • In a sense, the former. People looking for this person will be looking for Lord Gold the peer, not David Gold the lawyer. In any event, there is basis for making an exception to NCPEER. The fact that this person's link to notability is through his peerage only bolsters that fact. -Rrius (talk) 21:57, 3 February 2011 (UTC)[reply]
        • If he is most commonly known as Lord Gold, then why isn't that the title, rather than "David Gold, Baron Gold"? --Born2cycle (talk) 22:11, 3 February 2011 (UTC)[reply]
That is not a discussion for here. It gets us into other muddles, such as the differences between Barons and other ranks. It gives rise to other DAB problems (see eg Lord Campbell). Kittybrewster 22:47, 3 February 2011 (UTC)[reply]
Huh? Lord Gold is, at least for now, a red link. Are you saying this Lord Gold is not the primary topic for Lord Gold? Should there be a Lord Gold dab page? --Born2cycle (talk) 23:13, 3 February 2011 (UTC)[reply]
I think there should be one. But I think we should be consistent in directing it to David Gold, Baron Gold. Kittybrewster 23:17, 3 February 2011 (UTC)[reply]
Well, if it's appropriate for Lord Gold to redirect to this article, that means this subject is either the only, or the primary, use of "Lord Gold". Either way, if "Lord Gold" is more commonly used to refer to him than is " David Gold, Baron Gold" or "David Gold", then this article should be moved to Lord Gold. --Born2cycle (talk) 00:35, 4 February 2011 (UTC)[reply]
See NC:PEER; the format used is the appropriate one for a peer. -Rrius (talk) 00:39, 4 February 2011 (UTC)[reply]
See WP:TITLE and, since Lord Gold is more concise and more natural than the NC:PEER recommended "David Gold, Baron Gold", which is clearly more precise than necessary, see WP:IAR. We are under no obligation to follow guidelines that unnecessarily contradict so many principle naming criteria specified in policy. --Born2cycle (talk) 04:44, 4 February 2011 (UTC)[reply]
The naming convention is part of WP:Article titles by virtue of being an explicit naming convention. WP:Ignore all rules refers to ignoring rules in specific cases where unique circumstances justify ignoring a general rule. That is not the case here, and no one could reasonably argue that a rule should be ignored in all cases. You don't like the the naming convention. That's fine, but consensus favours retaining it, and this matter was just recently discussed. Your personal dislike of the rule is not adequate justification for this move, yet that is, when it comes down to it, all you and Lucy can marshal in support of your position. This RM discussion should be closed. -Rrius (talk) 09:07, 4 February 2011 (UTC)[reply]
It wouldn't be appropriate for the article to be at Lord Gold. An article so named would have as its subject the title itself, not its holder, and would begin something like: Baron Gold, of Westcliff-on-Sea in the County of Essex, is a life barony in the Peerage of the United Kingdom created on 1 February 2011 for the lawyer David Laurence Gold.... Opera hat (talk) 03:44, 7 February 2011 (UTC)[reply]
Fair enough... which takes us back to using David Gold (lawyer). Even if his peerage is what makes him notable, I don't see why peerage information should be part of the title of the article any more than "Mayor" should be in the title of anyone only notable for being a mayor. However, I wouldn't dispute using "(Baron)" or "(Lord)" as disambiguator in this case, instead of "(lawyer)". --Born2cycle (talk) 04:44, 7 February 2011 (UTC)[reply]
Actually, if someone is notable primarily for being a mayor, that would be a perfectly acceptable disambiguator.
As to the rest ... what exactly is the purpose of this? What exactly is to be gained by calling the article "David Gold (Baron)" rather than "David Gold, Baron Gold"?
We have a naming convention which provides a standardised way of disambiguating ambiguous peers. B2C offers no rationale for making this particular article an exception to that convention, and is continuing his old war-of-attrition tactic of arguing out every naming discssion without regard to the naming conventions. --BrownHairedGirl (talk) • (contribs) 20:26, 7 February 2011 (UTC)[reply]
Following naming conventions like WP:NCPEER is but one of several principle naming criteria put forth at WP:TITLE. Others include choosing titles which are more natural and concise. I grant that since disambiguation is required in this case, there is an argument to be made that this title should be disambiguated per the relevant specific naming convention. However, there is also the argument that the original title of this article, David Gold (lawyer), meets the criteria at WP:TITLE and the general guidance at WP:D better, and so does disambiguating with "(Baron)". Deciding which of these arguments is stronger is what this discussion is about. --Born2cycle (talk) 18:58, 9 February 2011 (UTC)[reply]
If naming conventions were just one of many possible approaches to naming articles, then the conventions would be pointless. That's entirely consistent with your view that nearly all naming conventions should be removed, but once again you are pursuing that argument in the wrong place.
Since the naming convention is in place, it's up to you to offer some specific reason why this particular article should be treated as an exception to the convention. You have not even tried to make that case. --BrownHairedGirl (talk) • (contribs) 15:39, 11 February 2011 (UTC)[reply]
My views about naming are explained in quite a bit of detail on my user page and in my FAQ. That nearly all naming conventions should be removed is not among them. Where did you get that idea?

The only changes I seek are in naming conventions that indicated titles which are inconsistent with the principle naming criteria outlined at WP:TITLE. To be sure, for many articles that criteria is insufficient, and more guidance is required, which is why we need naming conventions. But for those articles for which the principle naming criteria already indicates a clear, natural and obvious title that is consistent with usage in reliable sources, why cook up something different? How is WP improved by doing that?

This particular article should be an exception to NCPEER because the subject of this article has a natural title (his name), and even when disambiguated with his profession (lawyer) or title (Baron) is more concise than the one indicated by NCPEER. Now, if you don't think it's valuable for titles to be concise and clearly convey the natural/common name of the subject, you'll never understand my view. In short, David Gold, Baron Gold is an abomination (the title, not the person!). It is silly, stupid and certainly unnecessary precision to specify the person's surname twice in the title. --Born2cycle (talk) 02:49, 12 February 2011 (UTC)[reply]

Jesuitical response. You don't like NCPEER because you believe that it doesn't conform with your view that exceptions to COMMONNAME should be made in more limited circumstances than has been the community consensus so far. Fine, you're entitled to that view; but the way to pursue it is by a centralised discussion on the guideline, not this war of attrition which you justify on your talkpage by claiming that the "process of working for reducing skirmishes in naming through greater consistency in naming ironically requires being involved in many skirmishes". In other words, your objective is to change the guidelines, and you are pursuing that through your "many skirmishes" strategy.
In this case, you have eventually come up with an argument which tries to focus on this specific article rather than to the naming convention: conciseness. In fact that's just another general argument against the naming convention, because it will nearly always be possible to devise some sort of disambiguator which is shorter than "John Foo, Baron Foo". So that's an argument for changing the guideline, rather than for making this article an exception. Howver, your preferred title is only five characters shorter, so the whole thing seems rather pointless, and totally disproportionate to number of words taken in discussing your generalised anti-naming convention stance. --BrownHairedGirl (talk) • (contribs) 22:50, 13 February 2011 (UTC)[reply]
  • Comment I suggest it's telling that the name used here is just David Gold: [1] --Born2cycle (talk) 04:36, 7 February 2011 (UTC)[reply]
  • Could those who have already commented now please allow others to comment? General comments about policy should go on the relevant talk pages, not here. Thanks. Fences&Windows 20:22, 7 February 2011 (UTC)[reply]
    • Your only comment in this discussion is to stifle development of consensus through discussion? Really? What are you trying to accomplish here?

      First you implicitly support the unacceptable premature close of this discussion by inexplicably declaring the ANI discussion about it -- in which consensus about this discussion needing to be re-opened clearly developed -- to be "resolved" without anyone taking any action[2] [3], and now you discourage those participating in this discussion from commenting further for the dubious reason of "allowing" others to comment (as if others are somehow prevented from commenting while those already participating continue to comment). Why? --Born2cycle (talk) 18:58, 9 February 2011 (UTC)[reply]

Oppose Support - Common-sense dictates that the title should be as simple as possible; the title should be as easily understood as possible and as easily accessible as possible. For those reasons the simplest disambiguation should be used and that is the use of his profession. In the future if the individual becomes almost exclusively known for being a peer then the title is what should be used. Baron Gold though is not appropriate as not even BBC parliament refer to members of the House of Lords as Baron X they refer to them as Lord X. It should be Lord Gold (further geographic disambiguation if necessary), if the title is appropriate.--Lucy-marie (talk) 09:39, 12 February 2011 (UTC)[reply]
Regardless of what you consider to be commonsense, that is not what the naming convention says. It is wholly inappropriate going around arguing that articles should be somewhere other than where the naming convention dictates just because you hate the naming convention. The proper thing to do is take it up at the naming convention and accept the result of whatever discussion happens there. This serial moving and move opposition that you and B2C are doing is disruptive. Trying to get people to ignore the rule in every case instead of attacking the rule itself is bad form and petty tactics. -Rrius (talk) 06:11, 13 February 2011 (UTC)[reply]
All of guidelines and policies need interpreting with common-sense and stating that there has been no common sense in the application of a guideline as a cast Iron law is not inappropriate. Stating a specific naming convention is out dated and wholly inappropriate is not wrong but as valid as another user saying we must change this title just because of a specific naming convention. I would also like to state that I have initiated discussions on this issue and they have resulted in no consensus, but users in favour of iron cast enforcement of the guideline refuse to accept that there is no consensus. If you would like to take part in a discussion which i have initiated then please do so, also if you would like to initiate another discussion on the issue of NC:PEER i would be more than happy to contribute. Do not that attack the general process of challenging controversial moves and the process of RMs. RMs should only be avoided if moves are wholly minor or completely uncontroversial. The discussions which I have initiated show there is no consensus to keep up the enforcement of this guideline in it current form. There has been though no consensus on what changes need to be made to continue with a consensus. It is also inappropriate to suggest that any user on here is acting in anything other than the best interests of Wikipedia. Users will disagree but all users unless they are vandals are acting in the best interests of Wikipeida.--Lucy-marie (talk) 11:10, 13 February 2011 (UTC)[reply]
That is a longworded way of saying WP:IDONTLIKEIT regarding NCPEER. As Rrius says, this is not the place for that. Kittybrewster 11:45, 13 February 2011 (UTC)[reply]
The same is therefore true of your arguments simply being I like it, with regards to the blanket implementation of NC:PEER as a cast iron law. I have given a thorough and reasoned argument. All that has been given by Kittybrewster is NC:PEER, it says so, therefore it must be this way. As I have also said I have initated discussions before and am more than willing to take place in more discussions on the guidelines and policies at hand.--Lucy-marie (talk) 15:29, 13 February 2011 (UTC)[reply]
The proposal, as well as Lucy-marie's argument, give reasons based in naming policy on why this move should be supported. The only opposition is that NCPEER should be followed regardless of that.

There may be no consensus among the few participating here, but the closer must make a decision based on the consensus of the community, which is reflected most strongly in policy. --Born2cycle (talk) 20:15, 15 February 2011 (UTC)[reply]

The closer will no doubt make decision in accordance with the policy at WP:Article titles#Explicit_conventions, which states that "the article titles adopted should follow a neutral and common convention specific to that subject domain". In this case, the naming convention is WP:NCPEER.
B2C wants naming conventions to be ignored, but this discussion is not the place to pursue that objective. If B2C wants naming conventions to be abolished, he should seek a consensus to change the policy at WP:Article titles; and if he wants a change to this specific convention, then he should propose that at WP:NCPEER.
Since that has not happened, the onus is on those seeking to rename this article to demonstrate which it should be an exception to NCPEER. They have not even tried to do that, and instead have made general arguments against the naming convention, which do not belong here. --BrownHairedGirl (talk) • (contribs) 00:40, 16 February 2011 (UTC)[reply]
Can you please explain how renaming this article title fulfills the following "This practice of using specialized names is often controversial, and should not be adopted unless it produces clear benefits outweighing the use of common names", I fully am of the view there is no overwheliming benefit of using the specialised name in this case.--Lucy-marie (talk) 09:43, 16 February 2011 (UTC)[reply]
That question relates to the naming convention itself, and should be raised in a discussion on whether to retain the naming convention. Per WP:MULTI, discussions should be centralised, and it is disruptive to raise the same question about the naming convention in multiple discussions on individual articles. --BrownHairedGirl (talk) • (contribs) 19:51, 16 February 2011 (UTC)[reply]
What I find more disruptive is the blanket undiscusesed moves of pages based an a convention which does not enjoy the support of the wider community to keep on using it. All moves based only on NCPEER grounds are controversial and as such the approporiate RM must been initated, before all moves.--Lucy-marie (talk) 00:17, 17 February 2011 (UTC)[reply]
If you object to the naming convention, then seek consensus to change or remove it. In the meantime, the convention describes a way of naming articles on peers, subject to some exceptions, which even you don't claim are applicable here. --BrownHairedGirl (talk) • (contribs) 05:05, 17 February 2011 (UTC)[reply]
  • Oppose. I agree with Opera hat, amongst others. Proteus (Talk) 13:02, 22 February 2011 (UTC)[reply]
The above discussion is preserved as an archive of a requested move. Please do not modify it. Subsequent comments should be made in a new section on this talk page. No further edits should be made to this section.

ANI notice[edit]

Hello. This message is being sent to inform you that there currently is a discussion at WP:ANI regarding the premature closing of the WP:RM discussion about David Gold. The thread is Premature close of RM proposal.The discussion is about the topic David Gold, Baron Gold. Thank you. —Born2cycle (talk) 21:52, 6 February 2011 (UTC)[reply]

Consensus at that ANI discussion is clear: the proposal should not have been closed, so I re-opened it. --Born2cycle (talk) 04:37, 7 February 2011 (UTC)[reply]
I disagree with your assessment of consensus, but in any case consensus should weighed by an uninvolved editor. I have therefore restored the closure of the discussion. --BrownHairedGirl (talk) • (contribs) 15:19, 7 February 2011 (UTC)[reply]
I am not involved, and I judge that, until the discussion got sidetracked, the consensus was fairly clear. This was an inappropriate close and no harm will come from allowing the discussion to continue for the full week. Therefore I have reopened the discussion. — Martin (MSGJ · talk) 16:53, 7 February 2011 (UTC)[reply]

Sources[edit]

I've done some editing of the article, but it would be better to have some sources for the material here. Some of it (particularly the career summary) looks like it was lifted from the resume or summary at the law firm he works for. If so, that will need reworking to fit our style, but if those who have edited the article could provide sources, that would be good. At the moment, the text here follows the text at the Herbert Smith page far too closely. It is almost verbatim for the first two paragraphs for each. The other details appear to be from the Debretts entry for Lord Gold. Carcharoth (talk) 01:00, 7 February 2011 (UTC)[reply]

OK, this version is one that I'm happy with. The sources used are all still there, and the information can be added back in, but please rephrase and combine the information from different sources, and bring in other sources as well, so that what we have here doesn't reply too much on the phrasing and ordering of information as presented in other sources. Carcharoth (talk) 01:24, 7 February 2011 (UTC)[reply]

Copyright problem removed[edit]

Prior content in this article duplicated one or more previously published sources. The material was copied from: http://www.herbertsmith.com/People/DavidGold.htm. Infringing material has been rewritten or removed and must not be restored, unless it is duly released under a compatible license. (For more information, please see "using copyrighted works from others" if you are not the copyright holder of this material, or "donating copyrighted materials" if you are.) For legal reasons, we cannot accept copyrighted text or images borrowed from other web sites or published material; such additions will be deleted. Contributors may use copyrighted publications as a source of information, but not as a source of sentences or phrases. Accordingly, the material may be rewritten, but only if it does not infringe on the copyright of the original or plagiarize from that source. Please see our guideline on non-free text for how to properly implement limited quotations of copyrighted text. Wikipedia takes copyright violations very seriously, and persistent violators will be blocked from editing. While we appreciate contributions, we must require all contributors to understand and comply with these policies. Thank you. Moonriddengirl (talk) 13:44, 7 February 2011 (UTC)[reply]